TINTON FALLS – A group of nursing home residents bound for a day at the Shore safely got off their malfunctioning passenger van, minutes before a fire that consumed the vehicle and forced a nearly 10-mile backup on the southbound Garden State Parkway.

Once the fire was out and the scene cleaned up, the residents didn’t let that experience unnerve them. On board a second van, they asked to continue on the the Point Pleasant Beach boardwalk.

“They went down the Shore and had their pizza and icea cream. They’re on their way back as we speak,” said Susan Grosser, exectuive director at the Daughters of Israel home in West Orange.

The fire was reported at 11:40 a.m., according to 511nj.org, the state’s traffic reporting website. Minutes before, the Daughters of Israel group – a half-dozen staffers and eight residents – had been headed to Point Pleasant Beach, a routine summer trip for residents aged from their 70s into the 90s.

Riding in two vans, the group pulled over after passing Exit 109 when the driver of the first vehicle noted an unusual sound, Grosser said.

Worried that a mechanical problem might stall the first van, the drivers and staffers moved everyone onto the second van, which had room for all, Grosser said. As everyone was settling, to their shock ‘the vacated vehicle caught fire,” she said.

Staffers called 911 and firefighters came and extinguished the fire. No injuries were reported.

“We are really quite shocked. The bus is relatively new and it is well maintained,” Grosser said, “We’re going to investigate what happened.”

Grosser said staffers were in touch with the Essex County facility as the drama unfolded. “we’re really proud of them, the way they handled the whole situation,” Grosser said. As the excitement died down, the residents “asked to continue on” with their trip, she said.

During the fire, Parkway traffic cameras showed the express lanes crawling from exit 105 to as far north as milepost 114. By midafternoon, traffic was back to normal.